Purber^  Daniel  L, 


Missionary  Labors  of 
the  Apostle  Sliot 


m  ^ 


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l(?5- 

MISSIONARY  LABORS  OF 
THE  APOSTLE  ELIOT. 


<; 

H  Discourse 

Delivered  October  25,  1896,  Two  Hundred  and  Fifty  Years 
from  the  Time  those  Labors  were  Begun. 


By  REV.  DANIEL  L.  FURBER,  DD. 

Pastor  Emeritus  of  the  First  Church  in  Newton,  Mass., 
at  Newton  Centre. 


BOSTON 

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THE  APOSTLE  ELIOT. 


Ephesians  4:11.  “And  he  gave  some,  apostles;  and  some, 
prophets;  and  some,  evangelists;  and  some,  pastors  and  teachers.” 

Every  one  of  these  titles  may  be  applied  to 
the  man  of  whom  I  am  to  speak.  He  was  called 
the  “ apostle”  Eliot;  he  was  a  prophet  because 
he  spoke  the  words  of  God  ;  he  was  an  evangelist 
in  the  sense  of  being  a  traveling  missionary ;  and 
he  was  pastor  and  teacher  to  the  church  in  Rox- 
bury.  A  custom  existed  among  the  Indians  of 
never  passing  by  the  grave  of  one  of  their  chief 
men  without  leaving  upon  it  some  token  of  their 
regard.  They  believed  that  if  they  failed  to  do 
this  they  should  never  prosper  again.  If  the 
region  around  Boston  were  now  inhabited  by  their 
descendants,  how  thickly  would  John  Eliot’s  grave 
in  Roxbury  be  bestrown  with  pledges  of  the  un¬ 
dying  affection  which  they  felt  for  him  !  This 
tribute  of  their  gratitude  they  cannot  now  pay  to 
him,  but  we  who  live  amid  the  scenes  of  his  first 
missionary  labors  may  do  what  is  equivalent  to  it 
by  rehearsing  his  deeds.  There  is  an  especial 
reason  why  this  church  should  do  it,  for  he  was 
here  at  its  formation  in  1664,  and  assisted  in  the 
ordination  of  his  son  as  its  first  minister. 


4 


Having  graduated  from  Cambridge  University, 
where  most  of  the  Puritan  ministers  were  edu¬ 
cated,  Mr.  Eliot  became  an  usher  in  a  school  kept 
by  Thomas  Hooker,  not  far  from  London.  Mr. 
Hooker,  having  been  silenced  for  nonconformity* 
and  being  no  longer  permitted  to  enter  a  pulpit, 
betook  himself  to  teaching.  His  influence  upon 
Eliot  led  to  the  conversion  of  the  latter,  and  to 
his  devoting  himself  to  the  Christian  ministry, 
but  as  he  was  a  Nonconformist  he  could  not 
preach  in  England,  and  therefore  came  to 
America.  On  his  arrival  here  in  1631,  Mr.  Wil¬ 
son,  the  first  minister  of  Boston,  was  absent  on 
a  visit  to  England,  and  Mr.  Eliot  was  engaged  by 
his  church  to  preach  for  them  until  their  pastor 
returned.  He  was  so  much  liked  that  he  was 
urged  to  remain  with  them  as  an  assistant  to  Mr. 
Wilson.  Governor  Winthrop,  who  was  the  leading 
man  in  the  church,  says,  “  We  labored  all  we  could 
to  keep  him  with  us.”  But  he  had  promised  some 
friends  in  England  that  if  they  would  follow  him 
to  the  new  country  he  would  be  their  minister. 
They  came  the  next  year  and  made  their  home  in 
Roxbury,  where  he  served  them  about  fifty-eight 
years. 

When  he  had  been  in  Roxbury  about  fourteen 
years  he  began  his  work  for  the  native  Indian 
tribes.  He  said  that  his  object  was  threefold: 
first,  the  glory  of  God’s  grace  in  the  salvation  of 


5 


some  of  them  ;  secondly,  his  own  love  and  com¬ 
passion  for  their  poor  desolate  souls ;  and  thirdly, 
the  fulfilling  of  a  tacit  engagement  in  the  charter 
by  which  the  colony  was  established. 

In  looking  around  upon  these  tribes  he  beheld, 
first,  the  Massachusetts  Indians,  not  headed  by 
any  great  sachem  or  king,  but  scattered  in  small 
companies  through  a  district  extending  from  the 
coast  westward  as  far  as  to  the  sources  of  the 
Blackstone  River,  and  southward  to  the  river 
Neponset.  Their  chief  localities  are  embraced 
within  the  present  towns  of  Dorchester,  Newton, 
Concord,  and  Grafton.  Then  there  were  the  Paw¬ 
tucket  Indians  living  along  the  Merrimac  River 
at  Pawtucket  Falls,  the  site  of  the  present  city  of 
Lowell.  Westward  were  the  Nipmucks,  occupy¬ 
ing  a  large  part  of  what  is  now  Worcester  County. 
Southward  were  the  Wampanoags  under  the 
powerful  Massasoit,  all  along  the  bay,  at  Cape 
Cod,  and  on  the  islands. 

With  all  these  tribes  Eliot  came  more  or  less  in 
contact.  He  had  most  to  do  with  those  who  lived 
westerly  and  northerly  from  Boston  and  Roxbury  ; 
Massasoit  and  his  tribe  at  the  south  being  pro¬ 
vided  for  by  the  Mayhews  on  Martha’s  Vineyard, 
and  the  neighboring  islands  by  Mr.  Cotton  of 
Plymouth,  and  by  Roger  Williams  of  Rhode 
Island. 

On  the  twenty-eighth  of  October,  1646,  Mr. 


6 


Eliot,  in  company  with  three  other  persons,  who 
probably  were  Thomas  Shepard  and  Daniel 
Gookin,  of  Cambridge,  and  Mr.  Wilson,  of  Boston, 
made  his  first  visit  to  Nonantum.  Edward  Jack- 
son,  of  Newton,  was  constantly  present  at  the 
meetings,  taking  notes  of  what  was  said  and  done. 
He  was  the  man  in  whose  house  meetings  were 
held  by  the  people  of  this  place,  before  a  meeting¬ 
house  was  built  or  a  church  formed.  His  house 
stood  near  the  line  between  Newton  and  Brighton. 
Mr.  Eliot  had  previously  told  the  Indians  that  the 
superiority  of  the  English  over  them  was  owing 
to  their  knowledge  of  the  true  God  and  of  the 
arts,  and  to  their  industry  and  regular  habits. 
This  led  the  Indians  greatly  to  desire  instruction, 
and  when  he  told  them  he  would  come  and  teach 
them  they  were  in  great  joy.  On  the  appointed 
day  they  watched  eagerly  for  his  approach,  and 
when  he  came  in  sight  hastened  to  meet  and  wel¬ 
come  him.  They  assembled  in  the  wigwam  of 
Waban,  their  chief  man,  and  listened  an  hour  and 
a  quarter  to  a  sermon  from  the  text,  “  Prophesy, 
son  of  man,  and  say  to  the  wind,  Thus  saith  the 
Lord  God  ;  Come  from  the  four  winds,  O  breath, 
and  breathe  upon  these  slain,  that  they  may 
live  ”  (Ezek.  3 7  :  9).  The  preacher  explained  the 
commandments,  showed  the  “  curse  and  dreadful 
wrath  of  God  ”  against  those  who  break  them, 
and  then  preached  Jesus  Christ  as  “the  only 


7 


means  of  recovery  from  sin  and  wrath  and  eternal 
death.”  It  so  happened  that  the  Indian  word  for 
wind  was  Waban,  and  the  men  understood  the 
text  to  mean,  Prophesy  and  say  to  Waban. 

When  the  discourse  was  ended  they  were  asked 
whether  they  understood  what  they  had  heard. 
Many  voices  answered,  Yes.  They  were  then 
allowed  to  ask  questions,  and  the  first  question 
they  asked  was,  “How  may  we  come  to  know 
Jesus  Christ  ?”  The  preacher  then  said  to  them, 
“  You  must  think  of  what  we  have  told  you. 
You  must  think  much  and  often  upon  it,  both 
when  you  lie  down  on  your  mats  in  your  wigwams, 
and  when  you  rise  up  and  walk  alone  in  the  fields 
and  woods  ;  and  you  must  pray  to  God  to  reveal 
to  you  Jesus  Christ,  and  though  you  cannot  make 
long  prayers  as  the  English  do,  yet  if  you  do  but 
sigh  and  groan,  and  say,  ‘  Lord,  make  me  to  know 
Jesus  Christ,  for  I  know  him  not  ’  ;  and  if  you  do 
say  so  again  and  again  in  your  hearts,  He  is  such 
a  God  as  will  be  found  of  them  that  seek  -him 
with  all  their  hearts ;  and  you  must  confess  your 
sins,  and  mourn  for  them,  and  acknowledge  how 
just  it  would  be  for  God  to  deny  you  the  knowl¬ 
edge  of  Jesus  Christ  or  anything  else,  because  of 
your  sins.” 

The  next  question  was  whether  God  could 
understand  prayers  in  the  Indian  language.  The 
preacher  told  them  that  the  same  God  who  made 


8 


the  English  made  the  Indians  also,  and  therefore 
he  must  know  the  minds  and  the  speech  of  both. 
“For,”  said  he,  “there  is  a  basket.  It  is  made  of 
white  straws  and  black  straws  and  many  other 
things  which  I  do  not  know;  but  the  man  that 
made  it  knows  ;  he  knows  all  that  is  in  it.”'1 

The  preacher  greatly  interested  the  men  by  his 
gift  of  illustration.  In  speaking  of  the  existence 
of  God  he  said  :  “  If  you  see  a  great  wigwam  or 
a  great  house,  would  you  say  it  made  itself  ? 
Would  you  say  the  foxes  or  the  raccoons  had  built 
it  ?  You  never  saw  the  builder  of  it,  but  would 
you  doubt  that  it  was  made  by  a  wise  workman  ? 
So  when  you  see  the  sun  and  the  moon  and  the 
stars,  and  the  world  and  all  that  is  in  it,  you 
should  say  there  must  be  a  God  who  made  all 
these  things.” 

In  explaining  how  God  could  be  in  many  places 
at  the  same  time  the  preacher  pointed  to  the  sun. 
“  The  sun,”  said  he,  “  is  only  one  of  the  creatures 
which  God  has  made,  but  the  light  of  it  is  in  this 
wigwam  and  the  next,  in  Nonantum  and  in  Bos¬ 
ton,  in  Massachusetts  and  in  Old  England,  all  at 


1  Dr.  A.  C.  Thompson  quotes  from  “  Westerly  and  its  Witnesses  ”  the  story  of 
an  Indian  woman  in  Rhode  Island  who  became  deeply  interested  for  her  salva¬ 
tion.  Her  Christian  friends  exhorted  her  to  pray.  She  supposed  she  must  pray 
in  English  and  she  knew  but  one  English  word  —  the  word  “  broom.”  Her 
anxiety  became  intense,  and  at  last  throwing  herself  into  the  attitude  of  a  sup¬ 
pliant  she  cried  out,  “  Broom !  broom !  broom !  ”  God  answered  her  heart  in¬ 
stead  of  her  lips  and  filled  her  with  light  and  love  and  joy. 


9 


the  same  time.  In  the  same  way  God  can  be  in 
all  places  at  the  same  time.” 

In  showing  the  difference  between  outward  acts 
of  worship  and  a  right  heart  he  said,  “  Outward 
acts  are  the  shell,  and  a  right  heart  is  the  kernel. 
The  shell  is  important,  but  the  kernel  is  much 
more  important.” 

Other  questions  asked  by  the  Indians  were, 
“Why  did  not  God  give  all  men  good  hearts  that 
they  might  be  good  ?  ”  “  Why  did  not  God  kill 

the  devil  that  made  all  men  so  bad  ?  ”  “  If  a  man 

should  be  enclosed  in  iron  a  foot  thick  and  be  cast 
into  the  fire,  what  would  become  of  his  soul  ? 
Could  the  soul  come  forth  thence  or  not?”  “If 
a  man  talk  of  another’s  faults  and  tell  others  of 
them  when  he  is  not  present  to  answer,  is  not  that 
a  sin  ?  ”  “  Do  not  Englishmen  spoil  their  souls 

when  they  say  that  a  thing  cost  them  more  than 
it  did  cost  ;  and  is  not  that  all  one  as  to  steal  ?  ” 
A  drunken  Indian  asked,  “Who  made  sack?” 
But  the  other  Indians  silenced  him  and  told  him 
that  was  a  papoose  question. 

Two  weeks  later  another  meeting  was  held  at 
which  Mr.  Eliot  asked  the  men  whether  some¬ 
thing  did  not  trouble  them  after  the  commission 
of  sin,  such  as  murder,  adultery,  theft,  and  lying  ; 
and  what  they  thought  would  comfort  them 
against  this  trouble  when  they  should  die  and 
appear  before  God.  They  answered  that  they 


IO 


were  troubled,  and  that  they  could  not  tell  what 
would  comfort  them.  The  preacher  then  told 
them  that  God  had  sent  Jesus  Christ  to  die  for 
their  sins,  and  to  satisfy  the  justice  of  God  by 
his  sufferings  in  their  stead  and  room,  if  they  did 
repent  and  believe  the  gospel,  and  that  he  would 
love  the  poor  miserable  Indians  if  now  they  sought 
God  and  believed  in  Jesus  Christ. 

An  aged  Indian  asked  if  it  was  not  too  late  for 
such  an  old  man  as  he  to  repent  and  seek  after 
God.  Two  or  three  others  were  so  much  affected 
by  what  had  been  said  to  them  that  they  could 
not  conceal  their  weeping,  though  they  tried  much 
to  do  it.  “We  observed,”  says  Eliot,  “that  one 
of  them,  having  his  eyes  red  with  weeping,  turned 
his  face  to  a  corner  of  the  wigwam  to  avoid  being 
seen  ;  at  which  we  went  to  him  and  spoke  encour¬ 
aging  words.  But  hearing  these  he  fell  to  weep¬ 
ing  more  and  more,  which  forced  us  also  to  weep 
with  him.”  This  meeting  lasted  the  whole  after¬ 
noon,  and  such  was  the  effect  of  the  truth  that 
Waban  and  his  men  could  not  sleep.  He  prayed 
with  them  and  instructed  them  at  intervals  through 
the  night. 

The  attention  of  the  missionary  was  next 
turned  to  the  Pawtucket  Indians  on  the  Merrimac 
River,  and  then  to  tribes  westward  from  Boston. 
Four  times  in  the  summer  of  1648  he  made  jour¬ 
neys  to  the  vicinity  of  what  is  now  the  town  of 


Lancaster,  forty  miles  from  Roxbury,  where  he 
found  men  eager  for  the  gospel.  From  this  point 
he  went  still  farther  west,  as  far  as  to  the  present 
town  of  Brookfield.  The  distance  was  sixty  miles. 
There  were  no  roads,  no  bridges,  and  no  comfort¬ 
able  houses  for  lodging  and  refreshment.  Swollen 
rivers  must  be  forded,  and  drenching  rains  en¬ 
dured,  which  made  the  ground  soft  and  oozy,  and 
the  progress  of  the  journey  tediously  slow.  There 
were  also  hostilities  among  the  Indian  tribes,  which 
made  traveling  dangerous.  But  Shawanon,  the 
sachem  of  the  Nashaways,  accompanied  Eliot 
with  a  guard  of  twenty  men,  by  whose  help  he 
accomplished  his  journey  at  the  cost  of  incredible 
hardship.  “  It  pleased  God,”  says  he,  “to  exercise 
us  with  such  tedious  raine  and  bad  weather,  that 
we  were  extreme  wet,  insomuch  that  I  was  not 
dry,  night  nor  day,  from  the  third  day  of  the  week 
unto  the  sixth  ;  but  so  traveled,  and  at  night  pull 
off  my  boots,  wring  my  stockins,  and  on  with 
them  again,  and  so  continued ;  the  rivers  also 
were  raised  so  that  we  were  wet  in  riding  through ; 
but  that  which  added  to  my  affliction  was  my  horse 
tyred,  so  that  I  was  forced  to  let  my  horse  go 
empty,  and  ride  on  one  of  the  men’s  horses.  I 
considered  that  word  of  God,  ‘  Endure  hardness 
as  a  good  soldier  of  Christ.’  ” 

Once  a  year  this  indefatigable  man  went  to  the 
region  of  the  present  town  of  Chelmsford  “  to 


12 


spread  the  gospel  net,”  as  he  said,  for  the  Penna- 
cooks,  who  every  spring  came  down  the  river  as 
far  as  that  to  fish.  He  made  long  tours  through 
the  Nipmuck  country,  where  were  established 
seven  praying  towns. 

As  a  result  of  all  these  labors  the  Indians  were 
induced  to  change  their  habits  and  live  more  as 
the  English  did.  They  pledged  themselves  to 
decency,  cleanliness,  good  order,  and  industry. 
They  renounced  polygamy,  ceased  their  howlings, 
left  off  greasing  their  bodies  and  decorating  their 
hair,  wore  suitable  clothes,  and  knocked  at  the 
door  before  entering  a  neighbor’s  house.  Previ¬ 
ously  the  Indian  had  looked  upon  labor  as  degrad¬ 
ing,  and  he  put  that  drudgery  upon  his  wife,  while 
he  went  hunting  and  fishing.  Now  he  was  willing 
to  work,  and  his  wife  turned  her  attention  to 
housekeeping.  He  learned  the  law  of  kindness  to 
his  wife,  and  when  any  violation  of  that  law  oc¬ 
curred  it  was  reported  at  the  lecture  which  was 
given  once  in  two  weeks,  and  the  offender  was  re¬ 
buked.  At  one  of  the  lectures  an  Indian  by  the 
name  of  Wampas  was  accused  of  beating  his  wife 
in  a  fit  of  passion.  He  immediately  arose,  before 
a  large  meeting,  which  was  attended  by  the  gov¬ 
ernor  and  others  of  the  English,  and  humbly  con¬ 
fessed  his  fault,  taking  the  blame  wholly  to  himself. 
Being  reminded  of  the  heinous  nature  of  his  sin, 
he  turned  his  face  to  the  wall  and  wept.  Many  of 


the  Indians  gave  evidence  of  a  radical  change  in 
them  by  their  prayerful  lives,  their  attention  to  all 
religious  duties,  their  honesty  and  truthfulness, 
their  kindness  to  one  another,  their  tenderness  of 
conscience,  and  the  meekness  with  which  they 
suffered  injuries  or  received  admonition  for  their 
faults.  They  prayed  morning  and  evening  in 
their  families,  and  before  and  after  meat,  kept  the 
Sabbath,  and  held  religious  meetings  among  them¬ 
selves.  Wannalancet,  sachem  of  the  Pennacooks, 
said,  “  I  have  been  used  all  my  life  to  pass  up  and 
down  in  an  old  canoe,  but  now  I  give  up  myself  to 
your  advice,  enter  into  a  new  canoe,  and  do  engage 
to  pray  to  God  hereafter.” 

In  1651  the  Nonantum  Indians  were  removed 
to  South  Natick.  One  reason  for  the  removal 
was  that  many  of  the  English  disliked  them  and 
wanted  them  to  be  farther  away.  Mr.  Eliot  did 
not  object  to  establishing  a  settlement  for  them  at 
South  Natick,  for  he  thought  it  might  correct 
their  roving  habits.  Some  of  the  Concord  Indians 
joined  them  there. 

The  settlement  was  on  both  sides  of  the  river, 
across  which  a  footbridge  was  built  eighty  feet 
long.  They  built  a  meeting-house  fifty  feet  long, 
twenty-five  wide,  and  twelve  feet  high,  with  a 
room  overhead  in  which  was  a  prophet’s  chamber, 
with  a  bed  in  it  for  Mr.  Eliot  to  sleep  in  when  he 
passed  a  night  there.  The  building  was  also  used 
as  a  schoolhouse. 


T4 


When  they  were  fairly  established  at  Natick, 
their  good  friend  and  teacher  desired  to  form  the 
praying  Indians  into  a  church,  and  for  this  pur¬ 
pose  he  called  the  neighboring  ministers  together 
to  listen  to  their  narratives  of  religious  experi¬ 
ence.  The  ministers  who  came  were  Mr.  Wilson, 
of  Boston  ;  Mr.  Shepard,  of  Cambridge ;  Mr. 
Allen,  of  Dedham  ;  and  Mr.  Dunster,  first  presi¬ 
dent  of  Harvard  College. 

These  men  were  satisfied  with  the  evidences  of 
Christian  character  which  were  presented  to  them, 
and  were  in  favor  of  admitting  the  converts  to  the 
privilege  of  a  public  covenant  with  God  and  of 
baptism  and  the  Lord’s  Supper.  But  so  strong 
was  the  prejudice  of  the  English  against  the 
Indians,  and  so  full  were  they  of  suspicions  of 
them,  that  it  was  thought  best  to  wait  until  a 
better  feeling  should  prevail ;  and  the  result  was 
that  a  church  was  not  formed  until  1660,  a  church 
of  between  forty  and  fifty  members  ;  and  this  was 
nine  years  after  evidence  of  fitness  for  church 
membership  had  been  given  that  was  satisfactory 
to  some  of  the  best  ministers  in  the  colony.  The 
narratives  of  religious  experience  were  written 
down  and  preserved,  and  can  be  seen  and  read  by 
any  who  desire  to  read  them. 

Mr.  Eliot  trained  the  most  gifted  Indians  to 
conduct  religious  meetings  in  which  they  explained 
the  Scriptures  and  gave  exhortations  to  their 


i5 


brethren.  At  one  such  meeting  Governor  Endi- 
cott  and  Mr.  Wilson  were  present,  and  about 
twenty  other  English  persons.  An  Indian  prayed 
about  a  quarter  of  an  hour,  and  then  explained  the 
parables  of  the  treasure  hid  in  the  field  and  the 
merchantman  seeking  goodly  pearls.  He  said 
the  hidden  treasure  was  the  knowledge  of  Jesus 
Christ,  including  repentance,  pardon,  and  the 
means  of  grace.  The  things  to  be  parted  with  in 
order  to  gain  it  were  their  old  customs  and  vices. 
The  merchantman  seeking  goodly  pearls  was  the 
poor,  praying  Indian  seeking  after  God  and  truth. 
The  pearl  of  great  price  was  faith  in  the  Saviour. 
In  order  to  buy  it  our  sins  must  be  cast  away. 
We  exchange  our  sins  for  the  pearl.  On  these 
points  he  dilated  with  fervor,  and  applied  them 
with  hearty  feeling  to  the  condition  of  his  Indian 
brethren.  After  this  a  hymn  was  sung  by  the 
men  and  the  women  to  an  English  tune.  The 
governor  and  Mr.  Wilson  listened  to  the  exercise 
with  great  delight.  The  governor  said  he  could 
scarcely  refrain  from  tears  of  joy. 

An  address  was  made  on  a  Fast  Day  in  a  time 
of  prevailing  sickness  by  Wauban.  His  text  was, 
“  They  that  be  whole  need  not  a  physician,  but 
they  that  are  sick.”  He  said :  “  I  am  a  poor, 
weak  man,  and  know  but  little,  and  therefore  I 
shall  say  but  little.  These  words  are  a  similitude, 
that  as  some  be  sick  and  some  well,  and  we  see  in 


experience  that  when  we  be  sick  we  need  a  physi¬ 
cian  and  go  to  him,  and  make  use  of  his  physic, 
but  they  that  be  well  do  not  so,  they  need  it  not 
and  care  not  for  it,  so  it  is  with  soul  sickness. 
And  we  are  all  sick  of  that  sickness  in  our  souls, 
but  we  know  it  not.  We  have  many  at  this  time 
sick  in  body,  for  which  cause  we  do  fast  and  pray 
this  day  and  cry  to  God  ;  but  more  are  sick  in 
their  souls.  We  have  a  great  many  diseases  and 
sicknesses  in  our  souls,  as  idleness,  passion, 
neglect  of  the  Sabbath,  and  so  forth  ;  therefore 
what  should  we  do  this  day  but  go  to  Christ,  for 
Christ  is  the  Physician  of  souls  ?  He  healed  men’s 
bodies,  but  he  can  heal  souls  also.  He  is  a  great 
Physician,  therefore  let  all  sinners  go  to  him.” 

Mr.  Eliot  gives  an  account  of  the  death  of 
Wampas,  who  on  his  dying  bed  said,  “  God  giveth 
us  three  things  in  this  world :  first,  health  and 
strength  ;  secondly,  food  and  clothes  ;  and  thirdly, 
sickness  and  death.”  His  last  words  were,  “  O 
Lord,  give  me  Jesus  Christ !  ”  And  he  continued 
holding  up  his  hands  in  silent  prayer  as  long  as 
he  had  strength.  The  Indians  had  been  in  the 
habit  of  flying  in  terror  from  dying  persons  and 
leaving  them  to  die  alone,  but  they  gathered 
around  Wampas,  weeping  and  listening  to  his 
gracious  words.  “Nor  am  I  able,”  says  Mr.  Eliot, 
“to  write  his  story  without  weeping.”  This  is  the 
Indian  who  confessed  with  tears  to  having  beaten 
his  wife. 


i7 


The  missionary  work  of  Mr.  Eliot  reached  its 
highest  degree  of  prosperity  in  1674,  at  which 
time  the  whole  number  of  praying  Indians  under 
his  care  was  1,100,  with  twenty-four  native  preach¬ 
ers.  Dr.  A.  C.  Thompson  doubts  whether  there 
are  twenty-four  Indian  preachers  now  in  the  whole 
country. 

I  will  speak  next  of  some  of  the  forms  of  oppo¬ 
sition  which  were  encountered. 

The  first  was  from  the  Indian  priests  or  pow- 
aws,  whose  supposed  connection  with  the  invisible 
world  gave  them  great  influence.  The  Indians 
had  great  fear  of  the  evil  spirit  or  Chepian,  as 
they  called  him,  and  the  main  object  of  their 
religious  rites  was  to  avert  his  wrath.  The  pow- 
aws  were  the  accredited  agents  for  doing  this,  and 
death  and  life  were  supposed  to  be  in  their  power. 
If  any  one  was  ill,  the  powaw  must  come  and 
appease  Chepian  before  health  could  return.  He 
came  as  priest,  physician,  and  juggler  all  in  one. 
His  howlings  and  dances  and  bodily  contortions, 
his  charms  and  incantations,  were  as  important  as 
his  roots  and  herbs  ;  and  with  these  frantic  per¬ 
formances  he  kept  his  victims  in  terror.  Even 
the  praying  Indians  stood  in  awe  of  him,  and  Mr. 
Eliot  said  he  could  observe  a  striking  difference 
in  their  countenances  when  a  powaw  was  present 
at  any  of  their  meetings. 

Another  form  of  opposition  was  from  the  sa- 


I 


18 

chems,  who  feared  a  loss  of  power.  Sachem  Cut- 
shamakin,  of  Neponset,  went  to  Natick  and 
demanded  in  great  wrath  that  Mr.  Eliot  should 
desist  from  building  a  town  there.  The  Indians 
were  frightened  and  ran  away,  leaving  Mr.  Eliot 
alone  with  the  sachem.  Setting  his  eyes  upon 
the  savage  he  said,  “  I  am  about  the  work  of  the 
great  God,  and  my  God  is  with  me,  so  that  I 
neither  fear  you  nor  all  the  sachems  in  the  coun¬ 
try.  I  shall  go  on  with  my  work,  and  do  you 
touch  me  if  you  dare.”  The  spirit  of  the  great 
chief  shrunk  and  fell,  and  the  Indians  showed 
their  pleasure  by  smiles  which  they  were  careful 
to  conceal  from  the  sachem. 

But  the  greatest  calamity  that  ever  befell  the 
missionary  work  for  the  Indians  was  the  desolat¬ 
ing  war  of  King  Philip  in  1675-1676.  This  was 
also  a  severe  trial  to  Mr.  Eliot,  for  it  brought 
every  red  man  under  the  suspicion  of  siding  with 
Philip.  Eliot  had  confidence  in  them,  and  so  had 
Mr.  Gookin,  of  Cambridge,  and  the  few  who  had 
intimate  knowledge  of  them  ;  but  the  efforts  of 
these  men  to  defend  the  Christian  Indians  from 
suspicion  only  resulted  in  drawing  hostile  feeling 
upon  themselves.  Mr.  Gookin  sometimes  feared 
to  walk  the  streets.  The  terror  of  that  war  in 
which  six  hundred  of  the  flower  of  New  England 
were  slain,  in  which  six  hundred  houses  were 
burnt,  and  twelve  towns  utterly  destroyed,  had 


l9 


created  such  a  panic  through  the  land  that  every 
man  with  a  copper-colored  face  was  looked  upon 
as  a  faithless  and  bloody  savage.  Such  a  torrent 
of  unreasonable  antipathy  Eliot,  with  all  his  in¬ 
fluence,  could  not  understand.  With  an  affecting 
tenderness  he  told  his  beloved  church  at  Natick 
that  their  settlement  must  be  broken  up,  for  the 
court  had  decided  that  they  must  all,  about  two 
hundred  in  number,  be  removed  to  Deer  Island. 
“And  now,”  said  he,  “you  will  learn  that  through 
much  tribulation  you  are  to  enter  into  the  king¬ 
dom  of  heaven.”  They  listened  sadly,  but  sub¬ 
missively,  to  the  decree  of  the  court.  Quietly, 
but  in  the  silence  of  a  heavy  heart,  they  took  with 
them  their  scanty  stock  of  food  and  clothing,  and 
bade  farewell  to  a  place  which  had  been  their 
home  for  twenty-five  years.  Boats  were  made 
ready  for  them  on  the  river  two  miles  above  Cam¬ 
bridge.  At  the  appointed  time  Mr.  Eliot  met 
them  there  to  console  them  and  to  assure  them 
of  his  unwavering  confidence.  “  All  who  were 
present,”  said  he,  “  were  deeply  moved  to  see  the 
quiet  resignation  of  the  poor  souls,  exhorting  one 
another  and  encouraging  one  another  with  prayers 
and  tears.” 

The  Stoughton  Indians  were  also  removed  to 
Deer  Island,  and  the  whole  number  collected  there 
was  five  hundred.  Mr.  Eliot  went  to  the  island 
to  visit  them  as  often  as  he  could.  He  found 


20 


them  patient  and  uncomplaining.  So  excellent 
was  the  temper  which  they  showed  that  they  soon 
began  to  regain  their  place  in  the  public  confi¬ 
dence  ;  and  then  it  was  thought  what  an  efficient 
ally  they  might  be  in  the  war  against  Philip.  The 
subject  was  opened  to  them  and  they  expressed 
themselves  ready  and  willing  to  fight  for  the 
English  against  Philip,  and  be  faithful  to  them  as 
they  said  they  always  had  been.  The  court  then 
recalled  from  the  island  all  who  could  be  service¬ 
able  in  the  war,  and  their  assistance,  as  a  military 
force,  well  acquainted  with  the  skulking  methods 
of  savage  warfare,  was  invaluable.  In  the  sum¬ 
mer  of  1676  they  took  and  killed  four  hundred  of 
the  enemy. 

On  the  twelfth  of  August  in  that  year,  the 
death  of  Philip  by  a  musket  ball  put  an  end  to 
the  war,  and  with  it  to  the  unreasonable  feeling 
which  had  existed  toward  the  Christian  Indians. 
Soon  after,  the  whole  company,  which  had  been 
banished  to  Deer  Island,  were  allowed  to  return. 
Some  came  to  Nonantum,  and  passed  the  winter 
on  the  same  spot  where  thirty  years  before  their 
apostolic  friend  had  first  met  them  with  the 
gospel.  He,  then  seventy-two  years  old,  reestab¬ 
lished  his  Nonantum  lecture  and  preached  to 
them  once  a  fortnight  all  that  winter. 

When  we  think  of  the  sad  fate  of  these  native 
tribes,  of  the  heavy  burden  of  injuries  under 


which  they  groaned,  and  of  the  cruel  suspicions 
which  pierced  their  hearts,  it  is  a  comfort  to  re¬ 
member  that  there  was  one  champion  of  their 
rights  who  never  forsook  them ;  one  steadfast  and 
unfailing  friend  who  loved  them  and  trusted  them. 

And  when  our  hearts  are  pained  by  the  long 
recital  of  grievances  which  have  been  suffered  by 
other  tribes  in  our  country  at  the  hands  of  a  faith¬ 
less  government,  grievances  which  it  is  now  too 
late  to  redress,  it  is  a  relief  to  remember  the  time 
when  words  of  kindness  and  of  compassion  were 
spoken  to  the  savage,  and  the  hand  of  affectionate 
confidence  was  extended  to  him,  and  to  know  that 
the  original  possessor  of  these  hills  and  valleys, 
these  plains  and  forests,  these  lakelets  and  streams, 
was  not  allowed  to  pass  away  with  only  the  bitter 
and  unrelieved  remembrance  of  suspicions  and 
defeats  and  wrongs. 

I  have  not  told  the  whole  story  of  the  mission¬ 
ary  labors  of  this  apostolic  man  until  I  have 
spoken  of  the  almost  incredible  achievement  of 
the  translation  by  him  of  the  entire  Bible  into 
the  Indian  tongue.  Edward  Everett,  in  one  of 
his  orations,  says,  “The  Christian  Church  does 
not  contain  an  example  of  resolute,  untiring,  suc¬ 
cessful  labor  superior  to  that  of  translating  the 
entire  Scriptures  into  the  language  of  the  native 
tribes  of  Massachusetts ;  a  dialect  as  imperfect, 


22 


as  unformed,  as  unmanageable,  as  any  spoken  on 
earth.” 

The  instances  in  which  the  whole  Bible  has 
been  translated  into  a  heathen  tongue  by  the 
single-handed  labors  of  one  man  are  very  few. 
There  is  Carey’s  Bible  in  Bengalee;  Judson’s  in 
Burmese ;  that  of  Hiram  Bingham,  Jr.,  in  the 
language  of  the  Gilbert  Islanders,  and  I  know  not 
whether  there  are  any  others.  But  Eliot’s  work 
was  done  long  before  theirs,  and  he  is  the  pioneer 
translator,  from  whose  patient  and  unwearied 
labors  have  grown  all  the  Bible  societies  in  the 
world,  and  editions  of  the  sacred  Book  in  almost 
every  language  under  heaven.  Let  it  be  con¬ 
sidered  also  that  the  language  of  these  Indian 
tribes  was  never  before  reduced  to  writing.  It 
had  no  literature,  no  grammar,  no  lexicon. 

When  the  translation  was  completed,  the  good 
author  said,  “  Prayer  and  pains,  through  faith  in 
Jesus  Christ,  will  do  anything.” 

The  first  edition,  consisting  of  fifteen  hundred 
copies,  was  issued  at  Cambridge  in  1663,  was  dedi¬ 
cated  to  King  Charles  II,  and  was  the  first  Bible 
ever  printed  in  America.  It  was  printed  at  the 
expense  of  the  English  Society  for  Propagating 
the  Gospel,  at  the  cost  of  nine  hundred  pounds. 
It  supplied  the  demand  for  twenty  years,  after 
which  there  was  an  urgent  call  for  another  edition. 
The  unwearied  translator,  at  the  age  of  seventy- 


23 


nine,  entered  upon  the  preparation  of  it,  greatly 
assisted  by  Rev.  John  Cotton,  of  Plymouth.  He 
lived  to  superintend  its  publication  in  1685,  an 
edition  of  two  thousand  copies.  It  was  doubtless 
one  of  the  sweetest  comforts  of  his  old  age  to 
think  that  the  book,  on  which  he  had  bestowed  so 
much  pains,  would  continue  to  be  read  by  succes¬ 
sive  generations  of  the  race  for  whom  it  was  pre¬ 
pared,  and  that  it  would  be  cherished  as  a  priceless 
treasure  by  their  posterity,  perhaps  for  hundreds 
of  years.  But  alas !  the  call  for  another  edition 
was  never  made.  It  is  probable  that  the  very 
language  in  which  this  Bible  was  written  has 
ceased  to  be  spoken.  The  tribes  who  once  read  it 
have  perished;  the  last  of  the  Mohegans  have 
passed  away,  and  it  has  often  been  said  that  prob¬ 
ably  there  is  not  an  Indian  in  all  America  who 
can  read  Eliot’s  Bible.  But  Bishop  Whipple  has 
recently  stated  that  there  are  five  hundred  Ojib- 
ways  in  Minnesota  who  can  read  it.  Even  if  this 
were  not  so,  the  Bible  has  value,  for  with  the 
Indian  grammar  which  Eliot  prepared,  it  is  an  im¬ 
portant  contribution  to  the  science  of  comparative 
philology,  and  as  such  it  is  the  object  of  the 
attention  of  scholars  in  our  own  time. 

Mr.  Eliot  was  the  author  of  a  number  of  books 
in  the  Indian  language,  among  which  were  a 
Catechism,  a  Primer,  and  a  Psalter;  and  he  trans¬ 
lated  into  that  language  Bayley’s  “  Practice  of 


24 


Piety/’  Baxter’s  “Call  to  the  Unconverted,” 
and  Shepard’s  “  Sincere  Convert  ”  and  “  Sound 
Believer.” 

Of  the  first  edition  of  the  Bible  there  are  said 
to  be  twenty-three  copies  in  America  and  ten  in 
Europe.  A  copy  of  it,  bound  with  a  metrical 
version  of  the  Psalms,  has  been  sold  for  twelve 
hundred  and  fifty  dollars.  Of  the  second  edition 
there  are  fifty  or  sixty  copies  in  this  country.  A 
copy  of  the  Bay  Psalm  Book  has  sold  for  twelve 
hundred  dollars.  Eliot  was  one  of  the  editors 
of  it. 

Cotton  Mather  says  of  Mr.  Eliot’s  preaching, 
“  He  could  have  said  with  Paul,  ‘  I  determined  to 
know  nothing  but  Jesus  Christ,’  ”  and  that  he 
mentioned  that  blessed  name  in  his  discourses 
with  a  frequency  like  that  with  which  Paul  men¬ 
tions  it  in  his  epistles.  He  says  also  that  he  was 
like  Moses,  because  his  face  was  continually  shin¬ 
ing  as  a  result  of  his  communion  with  God.  In 
one  of  his  sermons  Mr.  Eliot  says,  “  We  pray  in 
our  meetings,  we  pray  morning  and  evening  in 
our  families,  we  pray  in  our  closets  three  times  in 
a  day  if  we  are  like  David  and  Daniel,  and  we 
have  through  the  day  many  scores  of  ejaculations.” 
When  he  was  in  a  company  of  ministers  he  would 
say,  “  Come,  let  us  not  separate  without  a  prayer. 
God  looks  upon  his  ministers.”  The  name  “  pray¬ 
ing  Indian  ”  originated  with  the  Indians  them- 


2  5 


selves.  By  a  praying  Indian  they  meant  a  Chris¬ 
tian  Indian,  and  it  is  quite  possible  that  their 
teacher’s  instructions  to  them  on  the  subject  of 
prayer,  and  his  own  example  as  a  praying  man, 
may  have  led  them  to  speak  in  that  way. 

Mr.  Eliot  loved  children.  He  said  that  the  care 
of  the  lambs  was  one  third  of  Christ’s  charge  to 
Peter.  Whenever  he  went  to  Nonantum  he  filled 
his  capacious  pockets  with  apples  and  cakes  and 
goodies  for  the  papooses.  He  urged  the  establish¬ 
ment  of  schools,  and  through  his  influence  the 
children  in  Roxbury  were  better  educated,  so 
Richard  Mather  said,  than  in  any  other  town. 
He  gave  seventy-five  acres  of  land  for  a  school  at 
Jamaica  Plain,  and  provided  that  Indian  and  negro 
children  should  be  admitted  to  it.  He  tells  a  re¬ 
markable  story  of  what  he  said  was  a  manifesta¬ 
tion  of  faith  in  an  Indian  child  who  died  at  the  age 
of  three  years.  The  child  had  some  toys  with 
which  he  was  much  pleased  when  in  health,  but 
when  they  were  brought  to  him  in  his  sickness,  to 
divert  him  from  his  pains,  he  pushed  them  aside, 
saying,  “  I  will  leave  my  basket  behind  me,  for  I 
am  going  to  God  ;  I  will  leave  my  spoon  and  my 
tray  behind  me,  for  I  am  going  to  God.” 

So  full  was  the  heart  of  this  good  man  of  benev¬ 
olence  that  there  was  no  room  in  it  for  the  love  of 
money.  It  is  said  that  out  of  his  small  income  he 
gave  hundreds  of  pounds  to  the  poor.  The  parish 


26 


treasurer  at  one  time  in  paying  him  his  salary, 
knowing  his  habit  of  giving  his  money  away,  tied 
it  up  in  a  handkerchief  with  as  many  hard  knots 
as  he  could  make,  to  prevent  him  from  giving  it 
away  before  he  reached  home.  On  his  way  home 
he  called  at  a  house  where  there  were  poverty  and 
sickness,  and  told  the  woman  of  the  house  that  he 
had  brought  her  some  relief.  He  then  tried  to 
untie  the  knots,  and  after  working  at  them  a  long 
time  without  being  able  to  loosen  them,  he  gave 
the  woman  the  handkerchief  and  all  that  was  in  it, 
saying,  “  Here,  my  dear,  take  it ;  I  believe  the 
Lord  designs  it  all  for  you.”  Sometimes,  no 
doubt,  he  gave  away  more  money  than  he  could 
afford  to  give,  and  kept  too  iittle  for  himself  and 
his  family.  In  doing  this  you  will  say  he  was 
indiscreet.  But  is  it  not  evident  that  Paul  was 
very  much  pleased  with  the  Macedonian  Christians 
when  they  gave  more  than  they  could  afford  to  ; 
and  when  he  saw  that  the  depth  of  their  poverty 
abounded  unto  the  riches  of  their  liberality,  was 
he  not  very  proud  of  them  ?  Such  giving  shows 
true  greatness  of  soul. 

In  his  old  age  this  saintly  man  said  rather  play¬ 
fully  that  he  feared  his  friends,  Mr.  Cotton,  of 
Boston,  and  Mr.  Mather,  of  Dorchester,  who  had 
then  been  in  heaven  a  long  time,  would  suspect 
that  he  had  gone  the  wrong  way  because  he  stayed 
so  long  behind  them.  And  then  he  said,  “I 


27 


wonder  for  what  the  Lord  Jesus  Christ  lets  me 
live ;  he  knows  that  now  I  can  do  nothing  for 
him.”  Then  it  occurred  to  •  him  that  he  might 
teach  the  negroes  who  were  at  service  in  families. 
He  sent  for  them  and  they  came  to  his  house  once 
a  week  for  religious  instruction.  He  greatly 
blamed  the  English  families  for  neglecting  to 
teach  them.  There  was  also  a  blind  boy  whom 
he  sent  for  that  he  might  teach  him. 

How  much  of  the  spirit  of  his  Master  do  we 
see  in  this  godly  man  !  How  closely  did  he  walk 
in  the  steps  of  him  who  went  about  doing  good ! 
Care  for  the  poor,  care  for  the  Indian,  care  for  the 
negro,  care  for  the  blind,  care  for  everybody  that 
needed  help.  Well  might  Shepard  of  Cambridge 
say,  “  I  think  we  can  never  love  nor  honor  this 
man  of  God  enough ;  ”  and  well  might  Baxter  on 
his  dying  bed  say,  “  There  was  no  man  on  earth 
whom  I  honored  above  him.” 

Is  not  this  Christian  hero  well  worthy  of  the 
name  of  an  apostle  ?  He  was  so  humble  that  he 
did  not  like  to  be  called  an  evangelist ,  and  he 
asked  people  not  to  bestow  that  honor  upon  him. 
But  he  is  the  apostle  Eliot ;  he  has  been  called  that 

i 

for  nearly  two  hundred  and  forty  years,  and  we 
never  shall  call  him  anything  else. 

Having  enjoyed  in  the  mother  country,  at  one 
of  her  ancient  universities,  every  facility  for 


28 


mental  enlargement  and  liberal  culture,  here  in  a 
desolate  wilderness  he  enters  smoky  wigwams  that 
could  not  keep  out  the  wind  and  rain,  and  opens 
the  mysteries  of  the  gospel  to  men  whom  he 
described  as  “  the  dregs  of  mankind,  the  saddest 
spectacles  of  misery  upon  earth.”  To  carry  the 
message  of  salvation  to  such  persons  in  their 
miserable  hovels,  he  said  was  “like  opening  an 
alabaster  box  of  precious  odors  in  the  dark  and 
gloomy  habitations  of  the  unclean.”  “  He  had 
popular  talents  which  gave  him  distinction  among 
the  first  divines  of  Massachusetts,  at  a  time  when 
the  clergy  were  held  in  peculiar  honor  ;  ”  and  yet, 
such  was  the  love  and  compassion  which  he  felt 
for  these  “poor  desolate  souls,”  as  he  called  them, 
that  the  fame  of  his  labors  in  their  behalf  is  his 
chief  distinction,  and  he  is  more  known  to  the 
world  as  the  apostle  to  the  Indians  than  as  the 
Roxbury  minister.  Richard  Baxter  said  to  him  in 
a  letter,  “  There  is  no  man  on  earth  whose  work  I 
think  more  honorable  than  yours.  The  industry 
of  the  Jesuits  and  friars,  and  their  successes  in 
Congo,  Japan,  and  China,  shame  us  all  save  you.” 

And  yet  how  evident  it  is  that  Eliot  did  not 
have  the  sympathy  and  help  in  his  work  that  he 
ought  to  have  had  !  The  great  body  of  the  Eng¬ 
lish  people  felt  little  or  no  interest  in  it.  They 
disliked  the  Indians  and  wanted  to  have  as  little 
to  do  with  them  as  possible.  Hence  the  removal 


29 


of  them  to  South  Natick,  and  the  long  delay  to 
form  them  into  a  church.  Hence  also  the  base 
and  cruel  suspicion  of  them  in  the  time  of  King 
Philip’s  war,  the  breaking  up  of  their  homes  in 
Natick,  and  their  banishment  to  Deer  Island.  But 
we  hear  no  word  of  complaint  of  all  this  from  the 
man  whose  work  was  hindered  by  it.  Did  it  not 
seem  strange  to  him  that  those  who  gave  him  no 
help  could  not  at  least  refrain  from  putting 
obstacles  in  his  way  ?  But  he  speaks  not  a  word 
of  censure.  Patiently,  meekly,  gently,  he  accepts 
the  inevitable,  works  as  long  as  he  can,  and  then 
waits  for  an  opportunity  to  do  more. 

If  he  had  known  that  the  Indians  were  a  short¬ 
lived  race,  soon  to  vanish  away,  would  he  have 
had  the  courage  to  toil  seventeen  years  in  trans¬ 
lating  the  Bible  for  them  ?  He  thought  they 
might:  be  descendants  of  the  lost  ten  tribes  of 
Israel  to  whom  precious  promises  had  been  made, 
and  though  they  were  living  in  such  deep  debase¬ 
ment,  they  were  no  more  beyond  hope  than  was 
the  valley  full  of  dry  bones  which  Ezekiel  saw, 
and  he  believed  that  the  breath  of  the  Lord  could 
blow  upon  them  and  make  them  live.  This  was 
what  he  had  in  mind  at  the  very  first  meeting  he 
had  with  them  in  Waban’s  wigwam.  Hence  the 
text  that  he  preached  from,  “  Prophesy  unto  the 
wind,  and  say  to  the  wind,  Thus  saith  the  Lord 
God  ;  Come  from  the  four  winds,  O  breath,  and 


30 


breathe  upon  these  slain,  that  they  may  live.”  The 
breath  of  the  Lord  did  breathe  upon  them  and 
they  lived.  Almighty  power  did  come  to  them 
and  lifted  them  out  of  the  horrible  pit  and  the 
miry  clay.  The  dayspring  from  on  high  did  visit 
them  as  they  sat  in  darkness  and  the  shadow  of 
death,  and  gave  them  the  light  of  life.  And 
though  as  a  race  they  have  perished  from  the 
earth,  the  names  of  the  praying  Indians  are  not 
blotted  out  from  the  Book  of  Life.  The  work 
which  their  beloved  friend  and  teacher  did  for 
them  was  wrought  upon  the  imperishable  tablets 
of  hearts  that  will  forever  respond  to  his  teaching, 
and  they  are  even  now  his  joy  and  crown  of 
rejoicing  in  the  presence  of  his  Lord  and  theirs. 

In  bringing  good  tidings  to  these  children  of  the 
forest  the  preacher  showed  them  very  plainly  the 
dreadful  consequences  of  rejecting  his  message 
and  of  dying  in  their  sins.  Carne,  in  his  life  of 
Eliot,  in  which  are  many  inaccuracies,  says  that 
the  missionary  painted  the  ineffable  love  of  Christ, 
and  the  blessed  state  of  those  who  believe  in  him, 
and  then  asks,  “  Of  what  avail  would  it  have  been 
to  set  before  his  audience  the  terrors  of  the 
Almighty  and  the  doom  of  the  guilty  ?  ”  But  this 
is  just  what  the  preacher  did.  In  the  original 
account  of  the  first  meeting  that  was  held  we  read 
that  he  spoke  “  about  the  joys  of  heaven  and  the 
terrors  and  horrors  of  wicked  men  in  hell.”  Carne 


3i 


acids  that  Eliot  was  a  “wise  man,  and  that  he  knew 
that  the  heart  loves  better  to  be  persuaded  than 
terrified,  to  be  melted  than  alarmed.”  But  Eliot 
was  no  wiser  than  the  Holy  Scriptures  are,  which 
address  the  fears  of  men  in  the  most  terrific 
manner.  If  he  had  spoken  only  of  the  ineffable 
love  of  Christ  and  never  mentioned  the  wrath  of 
God  and  of  the  Lamb,  he  would  have  misrepre¬ 
sented  the  character  of  God,  would  have  delivered 
only  a  part  of  the  message  which  he  was  sent  to 
deliver,  and  would  have  shown  himself  unfit  to  be 
a  messenger  at  all,  except  to  those  who  say, 
“  Speak  unto  us  smooth  things,  prophesy  deceits.” 
We  are  contemplating  the  career  of  a  successful 
missionary,  and  it  is  important  to  know  the  course 
he  pursued.  We  find  that  like  his  Master  he  went 
to  the  people  with  a  heart  full  of  love  to  them,  and 
like  his  Master  he  spoke  the  whole  truth  without 
concealment  and  without  evasion.  In  the  same 
way  may  any  missionary  or  minister  hope  for 
success  in  his  work. 

We  see  in  the  results  of  these  missionary  labors 
what  class  of  persons  it  is  that  is  most  influenced 
by  the  gospel ;  namely,  the  poor,  the  weak,  the 
neglected.  Our  Lord  said,  “To  the  poor  the  gos¬ 
pel  is  preached.”  Why  did  not  Massasoit,  the 
great  sagamore  of  the  Wampanoags,  receive  the 
gospel  when  it  was  offered  to  him  ?  Why  did  not 
his  son,  King  Philip,  the  terror  of  all  New  Eng- 


32 


land,  receive  it  ?  Because  he  was  strong,  and  had 
that  pride  of  power  and  sense  of  self-sufficiency 
which  so  often  lead  to  the  rejection  of  the  gospel. 
But  the  Massachusetts  Indians  were  weak.  They 
were  only  broken  and  scattered  fragments  of  a 
tribe  that  had  almost  been  swept  out  of  existence 
by  a  wasting  sickness.  They  looked  up  to  the 
English  as  a  superior  race,  and  were  willing  to  be 
instructed  by  them.  King  Philip  looked  down 
even  upon  a  Massachusetts  governor  because  he 
was  a  subject.  “  I  will  treat,”  said  he,  “  only  with 
my  brother,  King  Charles  of  England.”  So  haughty 
a  spirit  as  this  could  not  easily  submit  to  the 
humbling  terms  of  the  gospel,  and  he  rejected 
them  with  scorn.  He  was  not  the  kind  of  man  to 
say,  “  I  am  a  sinner,  and  feel  the  need  of  a  Sav¬ 
iour.”  Taking  hold  of  a  button  on  Mr.  Eliot’s 
coat,  he  said,  “  I  care  no  more  for  your  gospel 
than  I  do  for  that  button.”  But  the  Massachu¬ 
setts  Indians  were  of  a  lowly  mind,  and  to  them 
the  news  of  pity  and  help  from  an  almighty  Sav¬ 
iour  was  welcome.  It  was  good  news.  Oh,  blessed 
are  the  poor  in  spirit,  for  theirs  is  the  kingdom 
of  heaven  ! 

The  name  of  Eliot  has  exerted  a  stimulating  in¬ 
fluence  upon  the  cause  of  foreign  missions.  He  has 
been  called  the  morning  star  of  modern  missionary 
enterprise.  When  the  Pilgrims  and  the  Puritans 
came  to  these  shores  their  object  was  to  bring  the 


33 


gospel  to  the  aborigines  of  this  continent.  We 
commonly  say  and  sing  that  they  came  for  freedom 
to  worship  God,  and  so  they  did,  but  that  was  not 
all  they  came  for,  nor  was  it  the  principal  thing. 
The  charter  of  the  colony  of  Massachusetts  Bay 
states  that  the  principal  end  of  the  plantation  was 
to  win  the  natives  to  the  Christian  faith.  Gov¬ 
ernor  Bradford  speaks  in  a  similar  way  of  the 
object  of  the  Plymouth  Colony.  Eliot  carried  out 
the  purpose  of  the  plantation,  but  he  did  more 
than  that.  He  struck  a  note  that  has  been  vibrat¬ 
ing  ever  since.  It  was  heard  across  the  sea  in 
Old  England,  and  soon  societies  for  the  propaga¬ 
tion  of  the  gospel  in  foreign  parts  began  to  be 
formed  both  in  England  and  Scotland  under  the 
stimulus,  no  doubt,  of  the  good  news  from 
America.  Eliot  was  in  constant  correspondence 
with  Hon.  Robert  Boyle,  from  whom  the  money 
came  for  the  prosecution  of  his  work,  and  whom 
he  addressed  as  the  “Nursing  Father”  of  it. 
The  mother  of  Samuel  J.  Mills  in  Torrington, 
Conn.,  used  to  talk  to  her  boy  from  early  child¬ 
hood  about  John  Eliot  and  David  Brainerd,  that 
she  might  interest  him  in  the  missionary  work 
to  which  she  had  consecrated  him.  We  now 
speak  of  Mills  as  the  father  of  the'  foreign  mis¬ 
sionary  work  in  America.  He  it  was  who  said, 
“  We  can  send  the  gospel  to  India  if  we  will.” 
When  five  young  men  were  ordained  as  the  first 


34 


missionaries  to  India  in  the  old  Tabernacle  Church 
in  Salem  in  1812,  Dr.  Spring,  of  Newburyport,  said 
to  them  in  his  charge,  “  Go,  and  lay  your  bodies 
by  the  side  of  Ziegenbalg  and  Schwartz,  that  you 
may  meet  them  with  Eliot  and  Brainerd,  and  all 
other  faithful  missionaries  in  the  realms  of  light.” 

Though  it  be  true  that  the  men  for  whom  Eliot 
toiled  and  prayed  have  now  no  representatives  on 
the  earth  to  rehearse  his  deeds,  there  is  a  sense  in 
which  it  may  be  said  that  all  the  missionary  move¬ 
ments  of  our  time  are  indebted  to  him.  Think 
how  much  has  been  done  for  mankind  in  two  hun¬ 
dred  and  fifty  years  by  missionary  societies  in 
England  and  Scotland  and  other  parts  of  the 
Protestant  world,  not  one  of  which  was  in  exist¬ 
ence  when  Eliot  began.  Think  how  much  has 
been  done  by  our  own  American  Board  in  its 
eighty-six  years  of  seed-sowing  among  the  nations, 
and  of  what  his  example  did  for  that.  And  then 
think  how  many  stirring  appeals  on  the  platforms 
of  missionary  gatherings  have  been  made  eloquent 
by  the  use  of  his  name,  and  how  many  mountains 
of  difficulty  have  been  removed  out  of  the  way  by 
the  thought  of  what  he  accomplished. 

The  longest  life  on  earth  is  short,  but  it  is  long 
enough  to  exhibit  to  the  world  a  great  example, 
and  that  is  something  which  will  never  die.  Long¬ 
fellow  in  referring  to  the  well-known  fact  that  if  a 
star  in  the  remotest  depths  of  space  were  blotted 


35 


out  of  existence,  we  should  not  know  it,  for  the 
light  which  has  been  for  ages  on  its  way  to  us 
would  still  continue  to  shine,  beautifully  adds  :  — 

“  So  when  a  great  man  dies, 

For  years  beyond  our  ken, 

The  light  he  leaves  behind  him  lies 
Upon  the  paths  of  men.” 

The  man  who  lives  a  grandly  beneficent  life 
blesses  the  world,  not  merely  by  what  he  does,  but 
by  showing  what  can  be  done.  He  blesses  it  by 
his  deeds,  and  he  blesses  it  by  the  inspiring 
power  of  an  example  which  sends  into  thou¬ 
sands  of  ingenuous  hearts  the  impulse  of  a  desire 
to  be  like  him.  Oh,  that  this  might  be  the 
effect  upon  each  one  of  us,  of  our  meditation 
upon  this  great  life,  and  as  we  think  of  him  in  the 
shining  cloud  of  witnesses  who  look  down  upon 
us,  may  our  selfishness  and  slothfulness  be  re¬ 
buked,  our  hearts  be  filled  with  love,  our  hands 
with  diligence,  and  our  lives  with  self-sacrifice ; 
and  may  the  spirit  of  Him  who  came  to  this  world 
not  to  be  ministered  unto  but  to  minister  be 
upon  us ! 


DATE  DUE 

JAM  1 0  7 

l 

USE  FOR  ONE  MOR 

IH 

GAYLORD 

PRINTED  IN  U.  S  A. 

V*.  '/?, 


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